Two Kids, Two Ke70s And A 3000 Mile Road Trip!

[eiriksmil]

A couple of weeks ago, a buddy and me decided it'd be cool to go to the northernmost point of Europe, the North Cape in Norway. We both live in the capital Oslo, located on the other side of the country, in the south. None of us had been further north than Trondheim, which is a city 300 miles north of Oslo. We decided on going, why not, it'd be fun. We got some tips of what to see and where to eat from people on a Norwegian forum, I'd bring my 190k mile/306k km Rolla and my buddy would bring his boy scouts skills. This is the story of the two Norwegian kids on their journey towards the North Cape and the midnight sun. I'm going to be mentioning a whole lot of names you won't know. Keep Google Maps alongside you as you read, so you'll know where we are. Then you can hit up Wikipedia for more info on the places too, if that tickles your fancy. Here's a map that gives you a general idea of the area we covered, we were driving the European route E6 almost to the North Cape, then following the E45 to Östersund in Sweden, E14 to Sundsvall, E4 from there to Stockholm and E18 home to Oslo. Keep hitting up Wikipedia if you're lost :D

 

 

Day 1 - Monday

We had packed all our stuff the previous night and started driving north around 9 am, the time flied with the miles and life was good. We were driving through a valley called Østerdalen, which translates to the Easter Valley, on the Rv3 road. It was raining, but we would soon be happy in the mountains. Then the unthinkable happened, the front right tire blew out on a almost non-existing road shoulder and the car swerved into the ditch and after jumping two or three times, landed on a rock (either that or we moved the rock with the car).. Got the car back up on the road, it even started up, but this car could not take us to the North Cape, not the 180 miles home either.

 

We called a tow truck and were towed to the nearest garage. I was optimistic as usual and was just going to hammer out the control arm or whatever bent and drive on... Sometimes reality suck! Everything was closed, Toyota was 60 miles off and even if we had the parts, the car couldn't necessarily drive 3000 miles. As I was standing next to my KE70 thinking I needed a parts car, I recalled a KE70 I was going to look at when I was coming home from the North, which I was planning to use for parts.

 

Instead I called a couple of friends and the owner of said Corolla and talked a bit back and forth. We left the luggage in the white Rolla (that includes the camera, therefore no pics), took the train to Oslo and a few hours later I owned another KE70. I didn't even test drive the car (which was called Einar by the old owner), but we were going to the North Cape, that was definite.

 

Day 2 - Tuesday

Another try! Started driving north after sleeping at my buddies place and sorting the paperwork at around 11am. Einar is from a small place along the road to where the white KE was left, and probably felt more hope than what I did there. But we got there, and moved all the stuff over to the beige one. Even got use of the camera:

 

An unevenly lowered Rolla:

 

Einar og Rolla, side by side:

 

We continued where we left with a bang the day before. Exciting roads..

 

We scared away all the children, I jumped up on the world's largest kicksled where I apparently belonged:

 

The weather improved, Einar in his 4th county of the day after having played Alf Prøysen (a late kick-ass Norwegian singer) on his radio/cassette player:

 

Towards Trondheim, Norway's 3rd biggest city:

 

More lanes than two for the first time since greater Oslo:

 

We showed off Einar the Rolla at the local university:

 

Ate a burger at a recommended place, looked at the map and realised that the white Rolla's spectacular death (?) had delayed us by a lot so we kept on driving (after all, 300 miles a day wouldn't cut it). Amongst other cool stuff, we drove past Hell :D

 

The main road we were driving on from Oslo and almost to the North Cape, E6, became nicer after Trondheim:

 

Day 3 - Wednesday

Day 3 continued where the previous ended. We drove into the wee hours of the day through entertaining mountain roads and towards the midnight sun. This picture was taken around 12am:

 

And this about an hour later. The later it was, more light came from the sky - that's insane:

 

We drove past a place called Mosjøen and took this in Mo i Rana, where one of Norway's three big racing tracks are:

 

It was 4am and the action was not so great on the race track, in fact it was closed. Instead we drove past Bimbo:

 

The Polar Circle:

 

 

 

Towards a town called Bodø the weather again improved and I saw Einar in sunlight for the first time ever:

 

Then we were in Bodø. I drove over the city sqare because I thought was the road, saw two police cars within minutes after that and we slept for the first time in 24 hours and 745 miles/1200 kms..

Edited July 29, 2009 by eiriksmil

[eiriksmil]

Day 3, after an hour sleep

 

We then called a guy from a forum who lives in Bodø and I met him:

 

This sign translates to Quiet Valley:

 

Nice roads north of the town of Fauske:

 

Chill place:

 

 

Somewhere between Fauske and a place called Borgnes, where a ferry brings E6 over a fjord and alternativly takes you to an island called Hinnøya:

 

We took the ferry to Hinnøya. Me chilling out on the ferry:

 

Off the ferry:

 

 

An oldschool telephone box in the town of Harstad:

 

We ate a burger in Harstad and met another guy from a Norwegian forum:

 

Yngve, my buddy I travelled with, and his party look:

 

We couldn't figure out why Harstad was so quiet, but then we realised it was 12am:

 

 

Einar:

 

And finally, we saw it - the midnight sun:

 

 

Just before we went to sleep for a couple of hours:

 

Day 4 - Thursday

We just got into the county of Troms before we went to sleep. Woke up way too late and started driving north towards Alta and the county of Finnmark:

 

Some reindeer in the road, we would learn that was quite normal:

 

There were no more pics this day for some reason neither me or my buddy remembers, we just drove through one county (albeit a big one). Arrived in the town of Alta around 9pm, ate chinese and went to sleep in a cabin (the kind you'll find at campings).

 

Day 5 - Friday

We overslept as usual, didn't get on the road before 1pm, but we still made a good driving day, this is between Alta and Skaidi:

 

In the town of Hammerfest we had reached goal, atleast according to the banner above us:

 

We hadn't reached our goal though, so we continued (you guessed it, north). Finally we were getting close:

 

We're here!

 

 

From there we went south (!) and put up the tent near the place Oldenfjord, just 40 miles or so from the North Cape:

 

Day 6 - Saturday

The previous evening we had arranged to meet an old collegue of my mother, Alf, so the first place we went was Lakselv. The phone network was down though, so we didn't get hold of him before in the middle of the day. He was in a town called Karasjok, but luckily for us, that was just on our way to home. 35 miles later Alf treated us to traditional Sami food and showed us some movies regarding the Sami people. Me and Alf:

 

In Kautokeino Einar the Rolla wanted to race on a rally cross track:

 

After some gas and oil we contiuned. Finland!

 

Smooth Finish roads and lots of crap on the windshield:

 

After a little drive (maybe an hour or so), we were in Sweden:

 

This has got to be the slowest moving stretch of the whole 'international E-road network':

 

Not a lot of traffic:

 

Day 7 - Sunday

We slept in the car from 6am and overslept (again!!), woke up in Storuman, Sweden. On our way to the town of Östersund the roads were still clear:

 

Einar killed a bird, this became a huge attraction in Östersund, people started taking pics while we ate. When the Swedish took pics of it, we had to:

http://i67.photobucket.com/albums/h319/eir...il/IMG311-2.jpg

 

On our way to Stockholm the rainbow showed. I asked my buddy if we could go looking for gold, but we realised that was dumb - it ended in some water and we hadn't brought scuba gear:

 

Before we knew it (okay, after a loooong drive), we were in Stockholm, the capital of Sweden:

 

 

Here the camera died, but the last 6 hours and 300 miles/500 kms between Stockholm and Oslo were dark (no more midnight sun) and boring anyway. We rolled into the drive 6:30 am Monday morning, and had killed one bird, almost driven into a group of reindeer, avoided a Swedish moose/elk that found the road a cool place to be and driven almost 3500 miles/5700 kms since Day 2 with a car I had owned less than a week :D

 

Epilogue:

The white Rolla was collected home on Monday after some sleep and it's back where it belongs. On intial inspection, it looks like a strut has been torn in two and that's it. There's hoping :D

 

 

Thanks for looking :D

[JiP]

Interesting trip you've had. Good to see old rollas getting around up there :D

[7shades]

Cool writeup... Pics are awesome :D

 

See you in 2011 when I'm passing through :D

[dfunkt]

i was just over there, last week of june and almost all of july. we hired a car in helsinki for 13 days, took the overnight boat to stockholm, drove thru oslo out to burgen, stayed a few nights in skjolden for a glacier walk (http://www.jostedal.com/), took off east/north-east toward tornio, stayed in sodankyla with some relatives, then headed back to helsinki.

 

i couldn't believe how much snow was still around. we stopped on our way from oslo to bergen to play with a small patch just 15 meters from the road. then when we were heading back toward sweden we drove past a cross-country ski area. some of the snow banks on the side of the road were more than 2 meters deep. i still can't really believe it, when it was 22 degrees outside and perfect sunshine, there was snow everywhere!

 

i do envy you for having such wonderful landscape (and snow), but i didn't much like how expensive everything is and the 80km/h speed limit.

 

very nice story and big +++ for all the pictures.

 

dF

[Teddy]

Wow. That is a cool adventure :D

 

I want to pin this :D

[Toy-Yoda[RL]]

This, all of this, is awesome....... Very well done sir, I tip my hat to you.

[irokin]

Epic

[SoulSearcher]

WOW you went to hell, and bimbo, killed a bird, saw the midnight sun amongst other fabulous things, what an interesting a wonderful trip, and your write up was fantastic!!

 

Thank you for sharing :D

[JiP]

Don't forget the raindeer :D

[soyboy]

I laughed so hard at the photo of the bird, poor thing!

your trip looks amazing! Can't believe you get sunshine at midnight, that would drive me crazy

 

great work on the photos, hope we get to follow more of your adventures soon

[towe001]

Most times i'll just breeze through the write-ups and look at the pretty pictures. But, my man, the title, the lead up, the write-up, the pictures, just awesome :wink:

 

But i had thought all of Europe were all right hook cars

[eiriksmil]

But i had thought all of Europe were all right hook cars

 

Nope, only Ireland, the UK and Cyprus get right hand drive cars. Islands, in other words. Like Japan, Australia and NZ :P

 

I really appreciate all your comments!! And I couldn't believe my eyes when I saw it was pinned! :yes: :yes: In hindsight, I've realised that taking a KE70 on a this kind of trip was pretty crazy, but on the other hand it proves that you really can trust these cars :rolls:

[smeetsy1]

I loved it! wished there was more pictures of when your car wanted to rally :lol:

 

I'm inspired now :osama:

[Bowler]

Good write-up. I'd love to document such a drive, but unfortunately outside of the temperature extremes, we don't have quite the expanse of country to experience the time/light extremes that you have in Europe. Still, very entertaining,

 

Cheers